Tag Archive for: innovation

January 9, 2014
How often have you had discussions with someone only for them to say, “Well, that’ll never happen here.” Sound familiar? The problem is that when we think it won’t happen it invariably will, and when it does it’ll catch us out and cause bigger problems than we ever thought possible.
As we head – rush perhaps - towards 2014 I thought it was worth reflecting on a range of things we thought would never happen, and to use this history to remind us of just how changeable our world is Read more [...]

September 19, 2013
Few businesses are so vertically integrated that they can do absolutely everything. For most, there is the need to explore collaboration with other organisations in order to achieve their strategic goals.
But what happens when multiple organisations require the same learning and development solution? How can they jointly collaborate to achieve a common goal, ensure robustness of design and save money at the same time?
Story
In a previous post I urged businesses to seek out common areas Read more [...]

August 29, 2013
Data centres are getting more innovative. These massive buildings which hold thousands of servers handling more and more of our everyday internet life. As social networking and cloud computing increases, so does the size, power consumption and carbon footprint of these centres.
According to a study by Greenpeace conducted several years ago, data centres already account for 2% of global power demand and this figure is probably underestimated by a major factor today. This percentage is expected Read more [...]

August 22, 2013
Big data is the current hot topic, but is it a case of "Here we go again?" The next learning and development bandwagon is up and rolling and this time the wheels have been attached to big data. We’re being told that we’ve got to concentrate on big data; we’ve got to learn about it and we’ve got to embrace it (so some would say), but what’s the point of trying to grapple with big data when most of the people profession can’t really get their heads around small data!
In this post Read more [...]

August 8, 2013
The pharmaceutical industry has undergone a massive change over the past few years – moving from a ‘go it alone’ approach to drug discovery to one of open and effective collaboration.
Perhaps as People Professionals we can learn from this – learn to collaborate with one another to develop a better product for everyone – and not just a better product but one that’s of a higher quality, more educationally robust and better value. What more could you wish for?
Story
Not that many Read more [...]

August 1, 2013
We often talk about what makes a successful leader or a successful business, but what about a country – what makes an entire country a success? And if we knew what made a whole country a success, could we learn from this in our own businesses?
Story
An article in The Economist caught my eye. When ranked against a range of county-wide success factors such as global competitiveness, ease of doing business, global innovation, corruption perceptions, human development and prosperity.
When Read more [...]

July 18, 2013
In a recent post I talked about the power of storytelling. This week I’m turning my attention to the seven deadly sins that can impact on all of our stories in a negative way, and I’m going to suggest some approaches for dealing with them.
Story
Based on the original seven deadly sins, I thought I’d apply these to storytelling so that you always deliver the very best stories that you possibly can.
As a reminder, the seven deadly sins are:
Wrath
Sloth
Gluttony
Greed
Pride
Lust, Read more [...]

July 11, 2013
It’s not that often these days that we’re likely to take advice from an investment banker – and certainly not advice on learning! But an article in the Financial Times by Terry Smith contained some real pearls of wisdom that apply equally to People Professionals as they do investment bankers.
Story
Terry Smith is the chief executive of Tullett Prebon and also of Fundsmith LLP and his article – although directed at investors – was full of good sense for People Professionals.
Although Read more [...]

June 20, 2013
Genius is a word that can often be used inappropriately. However, where Burt Rutan is concerned it’s the right word to describe his work and, perhaps more importantly, his approach to the complex challenges he has overcome. Burt Rutan isn’t a name that most people are familiar with but as you’ll see in this week’s post it’s a name that has quietly delivered so much.
Story
I first came across the name of Burt Rutan while watching a compelling documentary about a little company Read more [...]

May 30, 2013
Twitter is a phenomenon – you just can’t escape it. Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched in July the same year. The service has rapidly gained worldwide popularity, with over 500 million registered users as of 2012, generating over 340 million tweets daily and handling over 1.6 billion search queries per day. Since its launch, Twitter has become one of the ten most visited websites on the Internet, and has been described as "the SMS of the Internet." There's a Read more [...]